The way down

Micro-stories from the third edition of the competition: High Altitude Storieswe let you enjoy with The way downby Juan Peláez Gómez, winner of the first prize in the micro-story competition., Tall tales III.

The way down

-by Juan Peláez Gómez-.

It went lower the higher it went up. I could see it at every step of existence.

The rope, as it passed through the carabiner, transmitted a singular lightness to him. A triangle of forces at the meeting, he, the past and its oblivion. Memories were worn away, scratching his fingers as he recovered them.

On that wall, above, a floor of stars. Far below her cat feet, skies of forests and melancholy. At the base of the track, incalculable distance, the whispers of them, of her.

When at last, the corporal passed through the carabiner, whiplash of loneliness. I knew it. Someday on the other side of the rope, nobodies, in the devastating plural. He had lost his someones in his countless years of life. They already seemed to him without lustre, without light, laughter, mountaineering and intimacies.

The last peak always came. Then the climb ascended into the deepest of solitudes.